4.1 Article

Phyto-remedial of excessive copper and evaluation of its impact on the metabolic activity of Zea mays

Journal

CEREAL RESEARCH COMMUNICATIONS
Volume 50, Issue 4, Pages 973-985

Publisher

SPRINGER HEIDELBERG
DOI: 10.1007/s42976-022-00259-0

Keywords

Antioxidant enzymes; Copper; Maize; Macromolecules; Metabolite solutes; Phenolic compounds; Photosynthetic pigments; Potassium

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Through hydroponic experiments, it was found that excessive copper treatment significantly affected the growth and photosynthesis of maize plants. The treatment led to damage to the cell membrane and accumulation of substances such as malondialdehyde. However, it also increased the activity of catalase and stimulated the accumulation of free amino acids and soluble proteins.
Maize is diagnosed as a heavy metal (HM) accumulator, while the tolerance mechanism is not sufficiently known. A hydroponic experiment was performed to test the ability of maize plants to tolerate and accumulate Cu. Excess copper treatments (ECu; 5 and 10 mu M CuSO4) considerably reduced plant growth, photosynthetic pigments, ascorbate peroxidase (APX), and guaiacol peroxidase (POD) activity. However, ECu significantly enhanced catalase (CAT) activity. ECu treatments reduced the leaf membrane integrity as indicated by increasing malondialdehyde (MDA) content in leaves. Proline and phenolic contents were considerably increased in maize organelles by ECu toxicity. ECu treatments considerably stimulated free amino acid (FAA) accumulation, total-soluble proteins (TSPs), and K in shoots, whereas these parameters did not change in the roots. Applications of CuSO4 did not affect the accumulation of total soluble sugars (TSSs) in shoots, while this accumulation enhanced in roots. CuSO4 treatments significantly increased the Cu concentration and uptake but decreased the Cu translocation factor (TF) and bioaccumulation factor (BF). Structural components such as cell wall components, proteins, lipids, and sugars were affected by ECu stress, as shown by infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) analysis. These results give a new insight into the strategy, which maize can use to treat the Cu-polluted environment as Cu accumulates within seedling tissues and the seedling can protect itself from ECu stress.

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